


putting the dog to sleep.

by offbrandevan (sevensevan)



Category: Glee
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Angst, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Internalized Homophobia, Mental Health Issues, Recovery, Sharing a Bed, Slow Burn, Therapy, no plot here, only sadness and angsty bullshit, post partum depression
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:13:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21816451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevensevan/pseuds/offbrandevan
Summary: A chance encounter with Quinn in the bathroom towards the end of sophomore year gives Rachel an absurd idea: what if her fathers adopted Quinn's baby?Loosely a season 3 rewrite, in which Hiram and Leroy adopt Quinn's daughter, and it changes everything.
Relationships: Quinn Fabray & Mercedes Jones, Rachel Berry & Kurt Hummel, Rachel Berry/Quinn Fabray
Comments: 11
Kudos: 51





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> i'm actually really bad at summaries, i've learned, so this is like. more about quinn's mental health and sexuality and rachel's issues and both of them learning to be actual human beings and falling in love than it is about beth. the summary also sounds fluffy. this will not be.
> 
> if you're here to hold me accountable for the fact that i haven't updated shadow of the day since july, i am very sorry. it will be updated again someday. i am not abandoning anything and it will be finished. this is just. an Idea i had that wouldn't leave.
> 
> also, to be clear: quinn's view of herself in this fic is not at All how i view her or what she's going through. i touch on some pretty heavy stuff at points, and i wanna be clear that, while quinn judges herself for it, that isn't the healthy or good thing to do. you'll see what i mean.
> 
> title from the antlers' song of the same name. i got attached to it as a working title and couldn't let it go. enjoy.

Rachel isn’t exactly _unused_ to the sound of girls crying in bathroom stalls. Mckinley High School is not friendly to anybody, and besides, this particular bathroom is a favorite for the particular quarter of the student body that spends a lot of time crying in stalls. There’s even a few chairs stacked in the corner, to sit in while washing the slushie out of one’s hair.

Rachel doesn’t usually make a habit of talking to the girls crying in the bathroom. It’s not as if she can do anything for them. Besides, she learned after her first few tries back in freshman year that, as empathetic as she is, she’s not particularly good at being _comforting_. She’s not good at much of anything when it comes to other people, really. She can feel everyone’s pain, but she only ever seems to be able to make it worse.

But—something is different, this time. The crying is muffled, muted. Something about it is nagging at Rachel, and she hesitates, looking at the stall door. Nothing seems all that unusual. Just as she starts to move on, dismissing her strange feeling, it swings open.

“Quinn?” Rachel’s eyes widen. Quinn freezes at the sound of her name, one foot out of the stall. She meets Rachel’s eyes, her jaw clenched.

“Berry,” she says neutrally. Her voice is calm, cold, but the evidence of her emotion is all over her face. The light mascara she’s taken to wearing since she got kicked off the Cheerios (she hadn’t worn a _lot_ of makeup in her cheerleading days, but certainly more than this, and Rachel is decisively refusing to think about how makeup-less Quinn makes her feel) is smeared, and her eyes are red.

“Are you okay?” Rachel asks. She tries to make her voice soft. Comforting. Quinn looks— _fragile_ , in a way that Rachel has never seen her before.

Quinn snorts. “I’m fine,” she says. The words come out sarcastic and grating. She goes to the sink and wets a paper towel, dabbing at her eyes.

“Quinn,” Rachel says again, but fails to follow it with anything. Quinn pauses in her cleaning and meets Rachel’s gaze in the mirror. They look at each other for a long moment. It has the strange.. _charge_ that Rachel has noticed between them occasionally. It appears when they’re fighting, sometimes, and it had been there when Quinn forgave her for telling Finn that Puck is the father of the baby currently nearly-formed inside of Quinn—maybe one of their heaviest interactions. It’s a sort of _electricity_ that springs up between them, and Rachel doesn’t know what to make of it.

Right now, she just knows that Quinn looks tired. More than tired. Hollow.

“I want to keep her,” Quinn says, snapping them both out of whatever trance they’ve been in.

“What?” Rachel says. It comes out a bit abrasively, and she winces, but Quinn doesn’t seem to notice her tone.

“The baby.” Quinn turns around, leaning against the sink, and meets Rachel’s eyes in real life, instead of through the mirror. “I—I don’t want to—to give her up.” She shrugs. “I never have.”

“Oh,” Rachel says. “ _Oh_. Quinn…”

“I have to, I just—“ Quinn shakes her head, and Rachel can see fresh tears forming in her eyes. “She needs to have a _life_. A good life. With—with parents who love her and can afford to feed her and—they need to be good people.” There’s an urgency to the way she says the last words. “They need to be _good_.”

“I think you’d be a good mother,” Rachel says. It’s the wrong thing to say. Quinn closes off. Rachel watches as it happens, as that familiar mask locks back down over Quinn’s features. Without a word, Quinn goes back to fixing her makeup. Rachel watches, a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach. She just wants to make things _better_ , but she’s upset Quinn all over again. Quinn pulls a bottle of eye drops out of her pocket, and Rachel suddenly realizes that this is _habit_ for her. She’s used to this.

Apparently, Quinn Fabray has spent a significant amount of time crying in the bathroom, and Rachel isn’t sure what to do with that information.

“Don’t tell anyone about this,” Quinn says as she turns to leave the bathroom. “Me being upset or…what I said.” The mask is still in place, and Quinn isn’t looking at Rachel, but the request sounds genuine, if not desperate, and Rachel can’t refuse.

“I won’t,” Rachel says, and for once, her words come out soft without her trying at all. Quinn nods once, still not looking at her.

“Thanks, Rachel,” she says, before pushing her way out of the bathroom and back into the loud, busy hallway.

Quinn had called her by her first name. Quinn had _thanked_ her. Rachel doesn’t understand the way it makes her chest tighten.

* * *

“I have an idea,” Rachel says. Her fathers both glance at her from their places in the kitchen.

“An idea?” Hiram says, looking back down at the vegetables he’s chopping. Rachel nods.

“An idea for Quinn’s baby,” she says, and this time, she gets both of their full attention.

“An idea for…” Leroy frowns at her. “I don’t understand.”

“I think we should adopt her,” Rachel says, and it’s probably good that Hiram has put his knife down, because the words make him jerk in surprise.

“You—what?” Leroy asks, stepping away from the stove. “Rachel—“

“Hear me out,” Rachel interrupts. She had prepared a PowerPoint for this argument, actually, but had decided at the last minute that it would be better if she just asked. If the request came straight from the heart, without the visual aid of multiple graphs explaining that they could afford another child. Hiram and Leroy exchange utterly speechless glances before turning to Rachel, waiting for her to explain herself.

“Quinn doesn’t want to give her up,” Rachel says. “The baby, I mean. She wants to keep her, but she doesn’t feel like she _can_ , given her current state of transience, and lack of financial means to support a child. She wants to give her daughter a good life. But she also doesn’t want to lose her entirely.”

“Okay,” Leroy says. “Quinn can do that without—there will be plenty of couples willing to have an open adoption for a healthy baby. She can stay in her daughter’s life. She doesn’t need _us_.”

“Maybe not,” Rachel says. “But she already knows you, or knows _of_ you. Besides, the nearest couple willing to have such an arrangement might be quite some distance away. If we took her, Quinn would be guaranteed everything she’s looking for. The baby would have financial security, a comfortable home, and excellent parents.” She smiles at them, because as much as Rachel has occasionally— _longed_ for a mother, her fathers have been good to her. Beyond good. “And Quinn would be guaranteed a relationship with her. It’s the ideal compromise.”

“For Quinn, maybe,” Hiram says. “Rachel, we’ve never wanted another child.”

“Haven’t you?” Rachel asks. “Or have you just never thought you could have one?” Both her fathers stare at her. “Adoption is—complicated, and expensive. Especially so for a gay couple. And it was a miracle you found a willing surrogate for me in the first place. So, do you not want another child, or has it simply not crossed your minds as an _option_?” Her fathers turn to look at one another.

“It’s not like the guest room gets much use,” Leroy says quietly. “We still have most of Rachel’s baby things. It wouldn’t be hard to make it into a nursery.” Rachel feels a quiet burst of victory fill her chest, but she pushes it down.

“Lee…” Hiram looks torn.

“Is that a yes?” Rachel interjects, unable to hold it back.

“It’s a probably not,” Leroy says. “It’s—we can’t just _decide_ on this, sweetheart. You have to understand, even if we agreed, Quinn wouldn’t—of course we would let her come see the baby, but she wouldn’t be her _parent_. We’d be her parents. Quinn would be…” There isn’t really a word for _a mother who isn’t a mother_ , but Rachel understands what he’s trying to say.

“I know,” Rachel says. “And I can explain that to her. Just—please, tell me you’ll think about it.” Hiram and Leroy exchange another look.

“We’ll think about it, Rachel,” Hiram says. “But that’s all we can promise you.”

“That’s all I’m asking for,” Rachel says, and it’s only mostly a lie.

* * *

“What do you want?” Quinn says the moment she enters the auditorium. It’s empty this late after school, after all of the clubs—including Glee—have already been dismissed. Rachel is sitting on the edge of the stage, her heart pounding in her throat.

(Inconveniently, Rachel’s mind picks this moment to notice how beautiful Quinn is. She wears her hair down these days, and it _does_ something to Rachel—it’s so different from the tight ponytail Quinn had worn with her Cheerios uniform. It’s flowing, and soft, and—it sort of makes Rachel want to hyperventilate, sometimes, at just how beautiful Quinn really is.)

“I have a proposition for you,” Rachel says as Quinn approaches the stage. Quinn raises an eyebrow, and that also does something to Rachel, though she ignores it.

“A proposition,” Quinn echoes. “I don’t swing that way.” It’s said without the _bite_ that used to accompany comments like that from Quinn, and it almost makes Rachel smile. It sounds like teasing. Dry, sarcastic teasing, but teasing. Not anger.

“Be serious, please, Quinn,” Rachel says. “It’s about…Beth?” Puck had sung that song in Glee a few days ago, and while he hadn’t _said_ anything about it, it was pretty obvious to Rachel what he meant by it. Quinn’s hand goes to her stomach, and she looks away.

“I haven’t decided if I’m staying with that yet,” she says. “Or if I’m…going to name her at all.”

“You should,” Rachel says. Quinn looks back at her, eyebrows slightly raised.

“Yeah?” she asks, and Rachel breathes an internal sigh of relief upon seeing that the mask is still gone. Quinn’s voice is curious, not defensive.

“Yes.” Rachel takes a deep breath. She stays where she is on the edge of the stage. She thinks she might need the high ground; what she’s about to say could make Quinn… _upset_. “Because I…I think I’ve found away for you to… _sort of_ keep her.”

“What?” Quinn asks. Rachel shrugs, half-smiling, waiting for Quinn to ask her to explain herself.

Quinn doesn’t.

“I told you not to tell anybody,” Quinn says, clenching her jaw. Rachel’s heart drops. “I told you—“

“Quinn.” Rachel hops off the stage, walking quickly towards Quinn. Quinn takes a few steps back, and Rachel realizes suddenly that Quinn is _afraid_. She doesn’t think she’s ever seen Quinn afraid before, and the sight makes her stop in her tracks.

“Quinn, please listen,” Rachel says. “I just want to help.”

“I didn’t ask for help, Berry!” Quinn snaps. Rachel flinches automatically. It’s just her last name, not an insult, but it’s that _tone_. It’s the same one that Quinn has used to call her _man hands_ , and _RuPaul_ , and _treasure trail_ , and—

“Please,” Rachel says again. “Don’t shut me out. Not yet. Let me explain first.” Quinn closes her eyes, a muscle twitching in her jaw.

“Fine,” she says, and it’s still tense, but it’s not soulless evil cheerleader Quinn. Not yet.

“I told my dads about what you said,” Rachel begins. “So you don’t have to worry about anyone here finding out. Noah or..whoever.” Quinn nods. “I told them because I—I wanted them to adopt your baby.” That forces the last remnants of the cold mask off of Quinn’s face, replaced by sheer _shock_.

“… _What_?” she asks.

“Hear me out,” Rachel insists, even though Quinn is making no attempts to leave. “You already know that they can provide her with a good, safe home, and money, and everything else that you mentioned before. And they’d be willing to make it an open adoption, Quinn. You could see her whenever you wanted. So could Noah.” She tacks on the last sentence as an afterthought, because as much as this plan will be good for him, too—Rachel has noticed the _longing_ look in his eyes whenever he talks about Quinn or the baby—Rachel has really only planned it while thinking of Quinn.

“I could see her?” Quinn is half-whispering, and Rachel can’t help but take another step towards her. This time, Quinn doesn’t back away.

“You could see her,” Rachel confirms. “You—you need to understand, though, Quinn, she would still be my fathers’ daughter. Not just legally. If they’re going to agree to this, _they’re_ going to be her parents.”

“But I could see her,” Quinn says again. “I could hold her, and talk to her, and—and—“ She stops there. She isn’t really looking at Rachel anymore; her eyes are a bit glassy. Rachel reaches out and takes Quinn’s hand.

“You could do all of that,” she says. “You won’t be her parent, but you could still be her mother.” Quinn nods slowly, her gaze sharpening once more.

“Okay,” she says. “Okay, I’ll do it.” Rachel blinks. She hadn’t really expected it to be that easy to convince Quinn.

“You’re sure?” Rachel says. “It took my dads three weeks to agree to it.”

“I’m sure.” Quinn squeezes Rachel’s hand. “It means I’ll get to see her, and it means she’ll be safe. I trust your dads. I have a great example of their parenting right here, after all.” Rachel flushes slightly, looking away.

“I suppose,” she mutters. “Though I can be selfish, and abrasive, and shortsighted, and—“

“You’re talented,” Quinn interrupts. “So, unbelievably talented, Rachel. And yeah, you can be all of those things, but it’s usually because you know exactly what you want, and people don’t listen to you unless you demand it. You’re brave, and strong, and a good leader when you try, and you don’t let _anybody_ get in the way of your dreams.” She lifts one shoulder. “If my daughter turns out like you, I think I’ll be proud.”

It’s easily the nicest thing Quinn has ever said to Rachel, and she’s speechless yet again. Quinn has an uncanny way of doing this to her, seemingly without even intending to.

“Thank you,” Quinn says quietly. She squeezes Rachel’s hand again before she lets go. “I’m going to go tell Puck. I’ll see you around, Rachel.” She hesitates for a moment, half turning towards the exit and half leaning back towards Rachel. Finally, she darts forward, wrapping her arms around Rachel, and Rachel is too stunned to return the hug. Quinn seems to understand, though, because when she pulls back, she’s smiling, and there are tears in her eyes once more.

“ _Thank you_ ,” she says again, and walks away.

* * *

Elizabeth Berry is born only a few hours after New Directions performs (and loses) at Regionals. None of the Glee club members know what to expect when they stand up onstage during the judging, because every single one of them was in the waiting room of the hospital as the baby was born—except, of course, Puck, Mercedes, and Rachel, who were in the room with Quinn.

(Rachel is pretty sure she’s going to have a hand-shaped bruise on her arm where Quinn was squeezing it for a _week_.)

They compromise on the name. Hiram and Leroy decide to call her Ellie instead of Beth, because _Beth Berry_ is a ridiculous name to saddle a child with (Hiram’s words, not Rachel’s), and Quinn agrees, but she also wants to use Puck’s name for their daughter, even if she’s not really _theirs_. So Ellie Berry it is, and Quinn is the first one to hold her when she’s born, kissing her forehead before she’s handed off to her new fathers.

Quinn decides to move back in with her mother, who shows up at the hospital with the desperate promise of a fresh start. Rachel watches them interact with a distinct discomfort in the pit of her stomach, but she says nothing. Quinn looks… _relieved_ at the prospect of going home again. She’s looked so _tired_ for the past few months, and Rachel—Rachel just wants her to be able to rest again.

If going home with Judy will give her that, then Rachel will keep her opinions to herself.

* * *

“She’s so small,” Quinn murmurs. This is not the first time she’s observed this in the few hours since they brought Ellie home from the hospital to the Berry house. She seems fascinated with just how minuscule a baby really is, staring at Ellie’s tiny fingernails as she drinks from a bottle.

(Quinn had looked so thoroughly _disgusted_ when Rachel had asked her if she intended to breastfeed a few weeks before Ellie was born that Rachel had begun researching formulas almost immediately. And, though they haven’t said anything, Rachel is fairly sure her fathers are more comfortable with this option, as well.)

“She is,” Rachel says, smiling. “She’s also asleep, I think.” Ellie has been a remarkably quiet baby so far, and Rachel is desperately hoping that will continue.

“Yeah.” Quinn looks up at Rachel. “Can I—can I stay here tonight?” Rachel hesitates, glancing into the kitchen where her fathers are. “I’m not trying to overstep my bounds,” Quinn says, seemingly reading Rachel’s concern. “I just—I would feel better. Being close to her.”

“Okay,” Rachel says. “I’m sure they’ll be okay with that if I ask.” A thought occurs to her suddenly. “But, you’ll have to stay with me, since the guest room is…” She makes a vague gesture. The guest room has been repainted a light baby blue (Quinn had virulently refused to go for pink when Rachel’s fathers had asked her; Ellie will not be raised under gender stereotypes, apparently) and the bed has been replaced with a a crib.

“That’s okay,” Quinn says, her gaze drifting back down to Ellie in her arms. “I share a bed with Brittany and Santana all the time, and they’re—a lot more _restless_ than you probably are.” Rachel hadn’t actually intended for Quinn to share her bed—she was going to volunteer to take the couch—but now that Quinn has suggested it, she isn’t about to say no.

(Rachel stubbornly refuses to consider what her sudden desire to share a bed with Quinn might _mean_.)

“I’ll go ask,” Rachel says, standing from the couch and heading into the kitchen. Leroy and Hiram are seated on barstools at the long counter, each with a glass of wine, talking quietly. They fall silent at Rachel’s entrance. “Can Quinn stay here tonight?” At her fathers’ uneasy looks, she continues. “She isn’t trying to—to claim your daughter or something, she just wants to be close to Ellie. She did give birth a day and a half ago, after all.”

“Okay,” Leroy says. “She can stay. But, Rachel…at some point, we’re going to have to set some boundaries with her.”

“I know.” Rachel smiles at them. “Thank you.”

“Well,” Hiram says, setting down his wine. “It’s past Ellie’s bedtime, I think.” He and Leroy stand, and move to leave the kitchen. Rachel stops them by throwing her arms around them both.

“I’m serious,” she says, her voice muffled against Leroy’s chest. “ _Thank you_.” Her fathers hold her tight for a moment before letting go, and they move as one into the living room.

Quinn is asleep. Her head is tipped back against the back of the couch, her eyes closed and mouth slightly open. She’s holding Ellie in her lap, and Ellie is sleeping, too, curled up against her mother.

Rachel finds the whole tableau just a little bit unbearably cute.

“Past Quinn’s bedtime, too, apparently,” she mutters, although neither of her fathers responds. Leroy steps forward, crouching down in front of the couch. He reaches out for Ellie, easing a hand under her head and gently lifting her out of Quinn’s arms. Quinn shifts in her sleep, her fingers curling where they’d been holding onto Ellie, but she doesn’t wake up.

Hiram takes Ellie and leaves the room, Leroy trailing close behind him. Rachel turns to Quinn’s sleeping form, watching her for a moment. Quinn looks pretty in her sleep, which is monumentally unfair, in Rachel’s opinion. Like she wasn’t already pretty enough awake.

Rachel doesn’t spend too long looking. She feels sort of creepy doing so, after all. Instead, she sits down beside Quinn and sets a hand on her shoulder.

“Quinn,” she says, shaking her slightly. “Wake up.” Quinn doesn’t respond. “Quinn.” Rachel shakes her a bit harder. This time, Quinn groans, shifting in place. She opens her eyes, squinting against the dim light of the living room.

“Rach,” she mumbles, glancing over at Rachel. Rachel feels herself flush pink at the nickname. Plenty of people call her that, but _Quinn_ never has before.

“Hi,” Rachel says, keeping her voice low. Quinn’s mask is still down, and Rachel doesn’t want to risk anything that might bring it back up.

“Where’s…” Quinn looks down at her arms, frowning.

“My fathers have Ellie,” Rachel says. “They’re putting her to sleep upstairs.” Quinn nods slowly.

“It’s going to take some getting used to,” she says. “Thinking of _them_ as her parents, instead of me.”

“I know.” Rachel doesn’t want to overstep her bounds, but she can’t resist—she puts an arm around Quinn’s shoulders. Quinn doesn’t resist the contact. She actually leans into it, resting her head on Rachel’s shoulder. “But we have time, Quinn. It’s going to be okay.” Quinn inhales sharply, and Rachel feels her tense up beneath her arm. For a moment, Rachel prepares herself for the mask to come back up, for Quinn to lash out at her, but then Quinn exhales slowly, shakily, and Rachel realizes with a start that Quinn is _crying_.

“Quinn,” Rachel says, turning slightly to wrap her other arm around Quinn as well, pulling her into a hug. “What’s wrong?” Quinn shakes her head and buries her face in Rachel’s collarbone.

“It’s—it’s going to be _okay_ ,” she says, her voice trembling. Not just her voice, Rachel realizes—Quinn’s whole body is shaking in Rachel’s arms. “It’s gonna be okay, Rachel.” She lifts her head, not breaking their embrace but shifting back enough to look Rachel in the eye. “Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve _believed_ that?” Rachel reaches up, wiping away a few of Quinn’s stray tears with her fingertips.

“I’m guessing awhile,” she says. Quinn half-smiles, her breathing beginning to slow once more, and nods vigorously. They sit like that for a few moments, looking at each other, Rachel’s arms still around Quinn, until Quinn seems to suddenly realize just how _close_ their faces are and clears her throat, shifting back. Rachel lets her go.

(She doesn’t want to.)

“Would you like to go to bed now?” Rachel asks. A thought suddenly occurs to her. “Have you slept at _all_ since Ellie was born?” Quinn shrugs.

“A little bit at the hospital,” she says. “But yeah, I’d—I’d like to go to bed, if that’s okay.”

“Of course,” Rachel says, standing. “Please, follow me. I can lend you some pajamas, although I doubt anything I have will fit you.”

“Are you calling me fat, Berry?” Quinn asks, raising her eyebrow as she stands.

“What?” Rachel says, her eyes going wide. “No! No, of course not, I’m—you’re taller than me, is all I’m—“ Quinn is smirking, and Rachel blinks rapidly as the realization hits her. “You’re teasing me,” she says, and Quinn laughs. It’s a tired sound, colored by the exhaustion that Rachel can see in the way Quinn sways slightly on her feet, but it’s genuine, and it makes Rachel’s chest feel tight and hot.

“I sure am,” Quinn says. “Don’t worry about the pajamas, my mom packed me an overnight bag.” Rachel nods, steadfastly ignoring the twinge of disappointment that echoes through her body at the realization that she won’t get to see Quinn in her clothes.

“Very well,” Rachel says, leading them both down the hall towards the stairs, with Quinn following close behind.

Getting ready for bed is…oddly comfortable. They take turns in the bathroom, changing and brushing their teeth. Quinn hums quietly, sleepily to herself from the other room as Rachel goes through her moisturizing routine, and Rachel tries her absolute hardest to not find it cute.

Eventually, though, Rachel turns off the lights, leaving the lamp on the bedside table as the only light in the room. Quinn crawls under the covers on the right side of the bed, getting comfortable against the pillow. She pulls the blankets all the way up to her neck, and Rachel has to bite back a smile at the image. She slides into bed next to Quinn, keeping a careful distance between their bodies, and clicks off the lamp.

Almost immediately, Quinn shifts closer to her. There’s a long pause, during which Rachel counts her inexplicably rapid heartbeats and listens to Quinn’s soft breathing beside her, and then Quinn scoots a bit closer again. Rachel switches to listening to her own breaths, trying to keep them rhythmic and even, despite the fact that she can now _feel_ the heat radiating off of Quinn against her side.

Quinn slides closer.

“Quinn?” Rachel says into the darkness.

“Yeah?” Quinn mumbles, clearly half-asleep.

“Do you—are you—“ Rachel sighs, and opts to bite the bullet. “Do you want to cuddle with me?” Quinn sits up.

“What the hell, Berry?” she says, and though Rachel can’t see her, she can hear the scorn in her voice.

“I don’t mean…” Rachel sits up as well, her vision adjusted enough to the dark that she can see the outline of Quinn’s face beside her. “It’s perfectly normal to—to want to be held, Quinn. Humans are social animals. We need contact. It makes us feel safe and protected and loved. It doesn’t _mean_ anything.” Quinn says nothing, and Rachel begins to wonder if she’s read the entire situation wrong. “I’m sorry,” she says. “You just…kept getting closer to me so I thought…”

“Whatever,” Quinn says, lying back down—though not getting any further away from Rachel. Rachel lies down beside her.

“I’m sorry,” she says again. Quinn grunts noncommittally. They lie there in silence for awhile, long enough that Rachel begins to relax, thinking Quinn is asleep.

Then Quinn rolls over, throwing an arm across Rachel’s stomach and curling into her side.

Rachel tenses for a moment. She can’t tell if Quinn is asleep or awake, and she doesn’t want Quinn to wake up in a position like this, especially given her reaction to Rachel’s earlier suggestion. But then Quinn shifts again, sliding farther on top of Rachel, and even if she wanted to, Rachel is no longer capable of escaping.

Hesitantly, Rachel slips her arm around Quinn’s waist. It seems to be the right move, as Quinn’s possibly-sleeping form presses closer to her, and lets out a soft, satisfied sigh. Her hands curl in the hem of Rachel’s shirt, and Rachel can feel Quinn relax against her.

Rachel, meanwhile, cannot relax at all.

Quinn is curled up on top of her like—like some kind of _jungle cat_ , and while Rachel is surprisingly comfortable with the position itself, the fact that it’s _Quinn Fabray_ lying on top of her is keeping her eyes wide open. Rachel’s hands are pressed against Quinn’s back and hip respectively, and she finds herself cataloguing the sensation in her mind.

Quinn is…softer than Rachel would’ve expected. Cheerio Quinn had flawless abs, solid muscle without an ounce of fat on her frame. This Quinn still possesses those cords of muscle, but they lie beneath a layer of post-baby weight that Rachel is suddenly realizing is the reason Quinn has worn nothing but oversized sweatshirts since she got out of her hospital gown. It makes Rachel’s heart twist sickeningly to think of both the source of the weight itself and the idea that Quinn would ever be ashamed of her body.

Rachel glances at her alarm clock and sees that it’s nearing eleven. She really needs to sleep. With a Herculean effort, she manages to force all thoughts of Quinn and Quinn’s body away, pretending that the warmth splayed out across her is simply a—a heated blanket.

A heated blanket with soft hands and hair that smells like oranges.

* * *

Quinn is alone when she wakes up.

It takes her a moment to remember where she is. The decor of the room is—well, it definitely isn’t what Quinn would choose for herself. Or anyone else still in possession of their sanity, except maybe—

_Rachel_.

She’s in Rachel Berry’s bed.

That realization doesn’t make Quinn panic the way it would’ve a year ago, or even a few months ago. It isn’t calming, certainly, and Quinn sits up, suddenly uncomfortable with the situation, but she doesn’t run away screaming, so she’ll count it as progress. Progress towards _what_ , exactly, Quinn isn’t sure, because even if she had the guts to go up to Rachel and say _sorry about all the slushies and insults, you’re actually pretty cool sometimes, also I’m gay and maybe have a massive gay obsession with you,_ she doesn’t think Rachel would take it very well.

“Good morning.” Quinn blinks, looking across the room, and it seems that her thoughts have conjured up their subject, because Rachel is standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame. “Sleep well?”

“Uh.” Quinn clears her throat, pushing a hand through her hair. “Yeah, actually. Pretty well.”

“Good,” Rachel says. “I could make you breakfast, if you like. It would give you time to take a shower.”

“Yeah,” Quinn says. “Sounds good.” She’s unable to force enthusiasm into her voice, and Rachel seems to pick up on it. She frowns slightly at Quinn for a moment—more a look of concern than anything—before leaving the room.

Quinn falls back against the pillows for a moment, unable to resist. She slept through the night. Slept _well_ , if the way she remembers feeling while drifting off in Rachel’s arms means anything. She slept more last night than she has since Ellie’s birth, and still, she just feels so _tired_.

Quinn gets out of bed before she can fall back asleep again, no matter how tempting that option is. She showers and dresses on autopilot, borrowing Rachel’s shampoo and trying to ignore the way her heart climbs into her throat at the idea of smelling like Rachel.

(It’s not as if she isn’t at peace with her feelings for Rachel. She is. She’s been comfortable with them for awhile, if not with the sheer _depth_ of the way Rachel makes her feel sometimes, but it’s just…easier to ignore them. To play them down. To not picture the inevitable rejection that will come, the day she stops being able to hold them back.)

Quinn spends quite awhile looking at herself in the mirror. Her body looks strange to her. It had looked _wrong_ , even grotesque, when she was pregnant, and even now it looks bizarre, with fat in odd places and muscle hardly visible anywhere. Quinn had spent most of her childhood not feeling at home in her body. She wonders if she’ll ever be able to reclaim that all-too-short year where she felt like she looked like _her_.

“There you are,” Rachel says as Quinn steps into the kitchen. “I made eggs for you. I wasn't sure how you liked them, so I scrambled them. That seems like the universal standard for eggs, from what I understand. Does anyone actually eat eggs that aren’t scrambled, or is that just in movies?” Quinn blinks at her. She’s not half-asleep anymore; her body isn’t moving with the sluggish clumsiness of exhaustion that she knows so well from Cheerios practice.

Her mind, however, is a different story. Her mind feels underwater.

“Scrambled is fine,” Quinn says, moving to sit at the long counter in the kitchen. She barely heard the rest of what Rachel had said, let alone understood it enough to respond. Rachel doesn’t seem to mind, though; she simply places a plate of eggs and a piece of toast in front of Quinn. Quinn starts eating, the motions automatic, barely tasting the eggs.

Eggs.

“Aren’t you vegan?” Quinn asks, looking up at Rachel. Rachel looks up from the dishes she’s doing, blinking in surprise at the question.

“I am, yes,” she says.

“Isn’t cooking eggs, like…” Quinn shrugs. “Against your honor code, or something?”

“Honor code,” Rachel echoes, half-laughing. “You make it sound like a cult.”

“Isn’t it?” Quinn mumbles. She glances up at Rachel, worried for a moment that the words came out angrily, but Rachel is smiling slightly, interpreting the words for the teasing that they are.

“Quinn,” she says, rolling her eyes. “Yes, it is against my _morals_ to cook eggs, but it’s the only breakfast food besides toast that I could be certain I wouldn’t ruin, and you did have a baby two days ago. I can make a few sacrifices to accommodate that.”

“Thank you,” Quinn says after a pause. “They’re, um, they’re good.” That’s a bit generous. They’re perfectly acceptable, but they’re _scrambled eggs_. They only get so good.

Rachel wrinkles her nose at Quinn. “Just because I made a moral sacrifice doesn’t mean you can convince me that eating unfertilized chicken fetuses could be in any way enjoyable.” It’s such a _Rachel_ thing to say, and her expression is so cute, and Quinn—

—well, Quinn sort of wants to kiss her, but she keeps that to herself.

“Just say _you’re welcome_ ,” Quinn says, shaking her head. She can’t quite keep a hint of a smile off of her face.

Quinn eats quickly and washes her own plate. She refuses to let Rachel do all the work, even if Quinn is technically the guest here. When they’re done, Rachel disappears back upstairs to change her clothes, and Quinn wanders down the hallway to the nursery.

Ellie isn’t in her crib, and Quinn experiences a moment of sheer panic before realizing that it is, in fact, ten-thirty in the morning, and of _course_ Ellie isn’t in her crib. She’s with one of Rachel’s dads somewhere—with one of _her_ dads somewhere.

Quinn really needs to start thinking of Hiram and Leroy as Ellie’s fathers.

Quinn wanders through the house—which is sort of absurdly large, much like Quinn’s own house, and she absently wonders what the Berry men do for work, since they clearly have money—until she finds herself in a study, and the tense knot in her chest relaxes. Leroy is sitting at the desk doing paperwork, Ellie carefully balanced and asleep in his lap. Quinn knocks lightly on the doorframe, and Leroy looks up from his paperwork, smiling politely at her.

“Quinn,” he says. “Come on in.” Quinn hesitates for only a moment before stepping into the room. She hasn’t spent much time alone with Leroy or his husband. Most of their discussion about Ellie had been either through Rachel or with her present, and Quinn isn’t sure what to expect from Leroy.

She shouldn’t be concerned, though, because the moment she takes a seat on a spare chair near Leroy, he scoops up Ellie in his arms and says, “Do you want to hold her?” Quinn blinks at him, staring at Ellie in his arms. She—she sort of _fits_ in them, her head nestled in his elbow. He holds her comfortably. Easily.

He’s had her for less than twenty-four hours, and he already looks like her father.

“I made the right choice,” Quinn says to Leroy. “You’re, uh, you’re gonna be an amazing dad. You already are.”

“Thank you,” Leroy says. “I have to admit, though, I’m surprised at how much faith you have in me, given how you treated Rachel in the past, and the church your family attends.” Quinn flinches and looks away.

“The things I did to Rachel, I…” Quinn shakes her head. “You’re not the one I need to apologize to for that.” Leroy doesn’t respond, but his eyes crinkle at the edges, the hint of a smile on his face. It’s the right thing to say, apparently. “And as far as church goes, and my family…I’m not my father, and I never shared his beliefs. I’m not a homophobe.”

“No?” Leroy asks. He doesn’t sound like he _doesn’t_ believe her, but Quinn still shakes her head vehemently, feeling the need to object to the idea as strongly as humanly possible.

“No,” she says. “I—I’m actually…” she licks her lips. “I’m…gay.” Leroy’s eyes widen slightly.

“Oh,” he says.

“Yeah.”

“Well then,” he says, nodding at Ellie in his arms, “how did this happen?” Quinn snorts, shaking her head.

“Denial is a hell of a drug,” she says.

“Don’t I know it,” Leroy says, nodding in agreement. Quinn doesn’t ask what he means. _Coming out_ is sort of enough emotional bonding for one day—and it must show on her face, because Leroy leans towards her just a bit and says, “Quinn, was that…the first time you told anyone?”

“Yeah,” Quinn says. “First time I’ve ever said it out loud, actually.” Leroy shifts Ellie to one arm and reaches out, setting a hand on Quinn’s shoulder gently.

“I’m very proud of you for saying it,” he says. “I know we don’t know each other well, but if you ever want to talk about it—“

“No,” Quinn interrupts. “No, I—look, I appreciate it, but it’s…not something I want to talk about.”

“Not ready?” Leroy asks, and the understanding note in his voice rubs Quinn the wrong way. She doesn’t _want_ to be understood. This—her sexuality, her problems with it or lack thereof—it’s _hers_.

“It’s not that,” Quinn says. “I just…” She shakes her head. “Please don’t tell anyone. Don’t tell Rachel.”

“I won’t,” Leroy says. “I promise. Who gets to know, when they get to know, all of that is your decision. I would never take that away from you.”

…Maybe he understands a little better than Quinn wants him to.

“Can I hold her now?” Quinn asks, nodding at Ellie. Leroy smiles.

“Of course,” he says, and hands her over. Quinn shuffles Ellie around in her arms, uncertain of how, exactly, to hold her. Ellie doesn’t seem to mind. She just sleeps, her face pinched and pink and wrinkly, her head smooth and hairless.

Looking at her now, Quinn isn’t…exactly sure what she’s supposed to be feeling, but she’s pretty sure she isn’t feeling it. She had been so _determined_ , those last few months before Ellie was born, to keep her daughter. Someway, somehow, she had been desperate to be in Ellie’s life. And now…in the abstract, she still wants that. She wants to see Ellie grow up, and know her first word, and read to her, and everything else that she had kept herself from picturing before they all became _possible_ , thanks to Rachel Berry. But, right now, looking at her daughter, Quinn doesn’t really _feel_ anything. It’s not like Ellie is a person yet. She’s just a little wrinkly _thing_ that cries and sleeps and smells weird. Quinn doesn’t look at her and feel some deep, maternal love, or connection, or something.

(Quinn is pretty sure that makes her a horrible person, or at least proves that she’s made the right choice, giving Ellie up. She could never have been a good mother.)

“She’s beautiful, isn’t she?” Leroy asks, and when Quinn looks up at him, and his eyes are full of love and _softness_ as he looks at Ellie, it feels like the universe is trying to drive the point home: Quinn doesn’t deserve this. Doesn’t deserve Leroy’s kindness, or Rachel’s loyalty, or the baby girl in her arms.

Quinn just nods, not trusting herself to lie out loud.

* * *

Twelve days after Ellie is born, Quinn finishes her sophomore year of high school. The day after that, she goes for a run.

She hadn’t been lying when she told Mercedes that being pregnant changed the way she thought about food. She doesn’t look at her dinner and see calories or miles she’ll have to run these days; she just sees food. Just survival, health. But Quinn knows what her body _can_ look like, and this—stretch marks, leftover pregnancy weight, fat in odd places, a total lack of muscle tone—this isn’t it. She just wants to look in the mirror and see _herself_ again. Besides, as much as she’s realizing that Sue Sylvester is actually a terrible person, and a terrible coach, Quinn wants back on the Cheerios in the fall.

So Quinn laces up the running shoes she hasn’t worn in months and takes off down her old weekend route—four and a half miles, down from her house to the park, around the pond and back. She knows it’ll be hard; she hasn’t really worked out in months, but she’s sure she can take it.

She’s wrong.

Quinn lies down on a bench when she gets to the park, chest heaving, spots in her vision. Her brain feels like it’s full of steel wool—scratchy and undefined, and _painful_. She should’ve brought water. She really should’ve brought water. There’s a few vending machines by the park bathrooms, but she’s not sure she can drag herself that far to buy a water bottle. Certainly not without catching her breath first, at least.

By the time she’s caught her breath, though, Quinn doesn’t really feel like moving. She wonders absently if she can just take a nap here on the bench. The sun is pleasantly warm, but not yet hot, and the hard wood feels like heaven beneath her back. Plus, she’s not sure she can move.

“Quinn?” a familiar voice says, and Quinn’s eyes slip open again, squinting against the sun. With an immense effort, she rolls her head to the side and sees Rachel approaching the bench.

“What are you, stalking me?” Quinn asks, her voice hoarse. Rachel raises her eyebrows, stepping up beside the bench.

“I could say the same,” she says. “You’re the one who’s at my house every other day.” Quinn groans. She doesn’t have enough energy to bicker with Rachel. Instead, she just closes her eyes again. A moment later, she feels movement near her face as Rachel sits down beside her head on the bench.

“Are you alright?” Rachel asks. Quinn hums.

“Went for a run,” she mumbles.

“A run,” Rachel echoes, a note of amusement in her voice. “A bit more difficult than you remembered?”

“So much fucking harder,” Quinn says, the profanity slipping out easily. She’s become sort of desensitized to it since she got kicked out. She’s exposed to it all day, every day at school, and the Joneses were a lot less strict about monitoring her language than her own parents had been. And now, her mother is afraid to tell her to _stop_ doing anything.

Or maybe just afraid to talk to her at all.

“I used to have abs, Rachel,” Quinn says. “ _Abs_. Do you know how much work that was?” She shakes her head. “I should’ve made Puck use a condom.” Rachel doesn’t respond for a moment, and Quinn wonders if she’s scandalized her. The thought makes her smile a bit: the (former) president of the Celibacy Club, making the girl who had come into a meeting of said club and proclaimed that _girls want sex just as much as guys do_ blush—though Rachel is oddly prudish, sometimes.

(Quinn wonders how Rachel would respond if she admitted that all those pornographic drawings of her in the bathroom stalls were the product of a _lot_ of thought.)

“Perhaps,” Rachel says, drawing Quinn out of her thoughts. “But I did get a baby sister out of it, so.” Quinn makes a face.

“It’s weird if you call her your sister,” she says. “Does that make me your aunt or something?” Rachel laughs, and it sounds how the sun on Quinn’s face feels.

“I don’t think it makes you my anything,” Rachel says. “But if thinking of yourself as my aunt means you’ll be nice to me, go for it.”

“I don’t have to pretend to be related to you to be nice to you,” Quinn says. Rachel is quiet again, this time for long enough that Quinn starts to open her eyes, squinting up at her with concern.

Rachel isn’t looking at her as she says, “Could’ve fooled me,” and that makes Quinn force her eyes all the way open.

“Hey,” she says. “I’m done with that. Alright? The stuff I did to you—it’s over. I’m done.”

“Because my dads adopted your daughter?” Rachel asks, still not looking at her. “I don’t want you to pretend to like me because of that. We would never keep you from her, regardless of how you treat me.” Quinn pushes herself into a sitting position, ignoring the spots in her vision and dizziness in her head.

“It has nothing to do with that,” she says firmly. “Look at me, Rach.” The nickname slips out easily, unconsciously, but Rachel flinches slightly in surprise at it, and turns to look at Quinn. “You never deserved any of the things I did,” Quinn says firmly, meeting Rachel’s eyes. “ _Never_. Okay? And it wouldn’t matter if your dads had my baby or if I had kept her or if some random couple got her, that would still be true.”

“I know I don’t deserve it,” Rachel says, and suddenly Quinn is regretting asking Rachel to look at her, because her gaze is intense, and Quinn sort of wants to look away, but she can’t. “But that doesn’t make it _hurt_ any less.” Quinn nods, biting her lip.

“I know,” she says, and Rachel scoffs.

“No, you don’t,” she says. “You’ve never been bullied, Quinn. You may have been harassed some this past year, but you’ve _always_ had people in your corner, whether it’s Santana and Brittany or Finn or Noah or me. You don’t know what it’s like to be alone. But me? The Glee kids don’t even _like_ me. They only put up with me because I win them competitions. You don’t know _anything_ about the way you’ve made me feel.” Quinn doesn’t argue with that, because it’s true. _Quinn_ has never been bullied, even if Lucy was.

(She’s pretty sure if she told the therapist her mom has her seeing how good she is at thinking of her past self and her current self as two different people, Dr. McMillan would have an aneurysm.)

Instead, Quinn just says, “I like you.” Rachel flinches at the words— _flinches_ , like she’s been slapped—and looks away.

“Don’t patronize me,” she says.

“I’m not.” Quinn turns on the bench, trying to bring herself closer to Rachel without mustering up the bravery to actually move _closer_. “I—I know I haven’t given you any reason to believe me, but I _do_ like you, Rachel. And I’d like the chance to prove it to you, if you’re willing to give it to me.” Rachel meets her eyes again.

“Prove it how?” she asks. Quinn barely stops herself from glancing down at Rachel’s lips. There are a _thousand_ reasons that kissing Rachel would _not_ be a good idea right now, not the least of which being that it wouldn’t really _prove_ anything at all, but the idea pops into her head regardless, and she has to fight to push it away.

“Well, I can be your friend,” Quinn says, “if you want.” Rachel looks at her for a moment, chewing her lip thoughtfully. They’re—much closer together than they probably need to be to have this conversation, but Quinn can’t make herself scoot away. Rachel’s eyes are gorgeous up close—a deep shade of brown that Quinn has to search to find an adjective for, before she settles on _entrancing_.

“My friend,” Rachel repeats. “I…would like that.”

“Yeah?” Quinn asks, risking a small smile. Rachel nods.

“I’ve sort of always wanted to be your friend,” she admits, and it feels like a confession—heavy, somehow. Quinn swallows hard, unable to look away from Rachel.

“Well,” Quinn says, desperate to break the moment, since she’s pretty sure that if it lasts any longer, she really _will_ kiss the girl, “as your first act as my friend, how would you feel about buying me a water bottle from one of those vending machines? I think I might actually pass out if I stand up.” Rachel laughs, rising from the bench, and the moment is broken, but Quinn’s stomach is still twisting inside her, and she still feels like she can’t quite breathe.

“I’ll be right back,” Rachel says, heading off towards the vending machines. Quinn rests her head against the back of the bench, trying to catch her breath and wondering what she’s gotten herself into.

* * *

It’s easy from there.

Quinn goes over to Rachel’s house nearly every day after that—partially to see Ellie, but mostly to see Rachel, who is just as amazing as Quinn was always terrified she would be. She’s actually not selfish at all, as long as they don’t talk about show choir. She’s _funny_ , and empathetic, and horrible at cooking, and gives amazing hugs, and Quinn is— _enamored_ , is the word she goes with in her head, because it’s strong enough without being scary. Quinn had already had a—a _thing_ for Rachel, on the basis of her voice and her legs, but now there’s _gazing_ , and _touching_ , and _inside jokes_ , and Quinn is losing her mind a little bit.

Not just because of Rachel. Ellie is getting bigger by the day, not to mention less bald and wrinkly, and still, Quinn doesn’t really… _feel_ anything towards her. She hasn’t brought it up with her therapist, because it’s downright _sociopath_ behavior, honestly. What kind of person can _have a kid_ and not _feel_ anything?

(Like father, like daughter, Quinn thinks in her darker moments.)

Outside of Ellie, too, Quinn feels strange. That steel-wool feeling has never quite left her head, and she’s tired all of the time. She starts sleeping past noon for the first time in her life, staying up late doing nothing on her phone and sleeping until her stomach is roaring at her to get up and eat. She sleeps, and runs, and visits Rachel, and even as her body starts to come back to her, Quinn feels like she doesn’t quite fit into herself anymore.

It becomes clear that the feeling isn’t just all in her head when she gets coffee with Mercedes, and ten minutes in, Mercedes leans back in her chair, frowns at Quinn, and says, “Girl, are you _okay_?”

“Uh.” Quinn isn’t really sure how to answer that. “Yes?”

“You sure?” Mercedes says. “Because you look ready to pass out, and that’s a four shot americano right there.” Quinn looks down at her mostly-empty paper cup.

“I don’t know,” she says. “I’m just sort of…lost, I guess? I don’t really know what I’m supposed to be doing, so I’m just…doing nothing. And it’s weirdly exhausting, actually.”

“You know what you need?” Mercedes says, shifting forward in her chair once more. Quinn raises her eyebrows. “You need a haircut.” Quinn’s hands go to her hair.

“Really?” she says, frowning. “It’s not that long.” Mercedes rolls her eyes.

“Not because your hair is too long,” she says. “Because you need a _change_. You’re in a rut, and those are a lot easier to get out of when you stop looking like the person who got stuck in the first place.” That…makes a surprising amount of sense, actually, and Quinn finds herself nodding in agreement. She’s in a rut. That’s why she’s tired. That’s why she doesn’t love her daughter.

It’s just a rut.

“Okay,” she says. “A haircut. I’ll make an appointment—“ Mercedes is already shaking her head.

“Nope,” she says. “It’s all about the spontaneity. Come on, Kurt can cut it.”

“Kurt?” Quinn says. “He hates my guts. And can he even cut hair?” Mercedes gives her a look, and Quinn sighs, silently conceding that yes, of _course_ Kurt can cut hair.

“He hates you because you’re a bitch to him,” Mercedes says. “But you’ve got _incredible_ hair, he isn’t going to mess with that. Besides, maybe you could apologize to him while we’re over there.” Quinn senses a hint of ulterior motive in the last sentence, but she ignores it. It’s not like she can get mad at Mercedes for wanting her friends to get along.

“Okay,” Quinn says. “I guess Kurt is cutting my hair.” Mercedes grins triumphantly, already pulling out her phone to text Kurt.

Quinn follows Mercedes on the drive over, and she figures she probably should be more intimidated than she is. But it’s just a _haircut_ , and it matters a lot less now that she’s been homeless and given birth to a child. If it goes wrong, it’ll grow back. The same thing can’t be said for a lot of the things that have gone wrong for Quinn recently.

“What are you looking for?” Kurt says, once they’re down in his room and Quinn is sitting in a folding chair, a sheet wrapped around her shoulders to substitute for an apron. Quinn looks in the mirror, at the bags under her eyes and the way her hair falls past her shoulders, obscuring her jawline and face.

“A change,” she says. Kurt rolls his eyes at her in the mirror.

“Well, _obviously_ ,” he says. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be here. What kind of change are we talking about?” Quinn considers it for a moment.

“Shorter,” she says, gesturing somewhere near the top of her neck. “Like, here-ish?” Kurt hesitates.

“You sure?” he says. “Coach Sylvester isn’t going to be a fan of that. Assuming you’re trying out for the Cheerios again.” Quinn considers that for a moment, pictures Sue Sylvester’s reaction to her disgraced Head Cheerio returning to school after having a kid and trying out for the team again, only for her hair to be far too short to even attempt the Cheerio signature ponytail.

“I don’t care,” Quinn says, and is surprised to realize it’s true. “Go crazy.” Kurt makes a high-pitched, excited sound, and whips out a pair of scissors before Quinn can change her mind.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so i've discovered that this fic has in fact no plotline? i'm just. doin whatever. i'm enjoying it at least so i hope yall do too i guess? anyways here's 7k words of gay rambling. enjoy.

Rachel is alone in her room when she hears the footsteps coming down the hall. Neither of her dads are home—Hiram is at work, and Leroy is with Ellie is at yet another checkup; Rachel had no idea babies required _so much_ medical attention—but Rachel doesn’t panic. It’s probably just Quinn, who has all but moved in since that day in the park, and never bothers ringing the doorbell.

Rachel is not prepared to look up and see Quinn with a _bob_ , and she drops her book when she does.

“ _Quinn_ ,” Rachel exclaims, jumping up from the bed. “Your _hair_.” Quinn smiles, ducking her head, and Rachel has to resist the urge to walk over to her and start running her fingers through her hair.

“It was time for a change,” Quinn says, and Rachel nods emphatically.

“It looks _incredible_ ,” she says. “ _You_ look incredible. Not that you weren’t already gorgeous before, but— _your hair_.” Quinn laughs and shakes her head.

“I’m glad you like it,” she says. Rachel isn’t sure _like_ is a strong enough word. With her hair like this, Rachel can see every inch of Quinn’s smooth, pale neck, the sharp edge of her jawline, the way it moves as Quinn smiles—

_Oh_.

Oh, Rachel has been _here_ before. With Jesse, with Finn, with a girl in her seventh grade homeroom that Rachel used to dedicate a significant amount of time to _not_ thinking about.

She has feelings for Quinn.

“Rach?” Quinn says, frowning slightly. “You still in there?”

“Yes!” Rachel says, louder than necessary. “Yes, sorry. Just—spaced out a little. I’m sorry. I’m here.” Quinn raises an eyebrow, and oh, _this_ is why that expression has always been so _interesting_ to Rachel. It’s _hot_.

_God, how long has_ this _been going on? How long have I been_ into _her?_

“I’m kind of surprised it turned out this well,” Quinn says, walking farther into Rachel’s room. “Kurt cut it yesterday.”

“ _Kurt_ did?” Rachel says as Quinn sits on her bed—and suddenly Rachel is very _aware_ of how comfortable Quinn is in her space these days, and how comfortable Rachel has been having her there. “I thought you still—I thought you didn’t get along.”

“You thought I still bullied him?” Quinn guesses correctly. “No. I told you, I’m done with that.”

“You said you were done doing that to _me_ ,” Rachel points out. “Not everyone else. Besides, aren’t you trying to rejoin the Cheerios in the fall? Isn’t being a terrible person a bit of an entrance requirement?” She tries to keep the petulance and _fear_ out of her tone, but judging by Quinn’s surprised look, she doesn’t quite manage it.

“You think things are going to change when I get back on the squad,” Quinn says. Rachel flinches, but can’t argue. _When did Quinn learn to read her like that_? “They’re not, Rach. The bullying, it’s—I mean, it definitely isn’t a _requirement_ to be a Cheerio. Brittany would never make the squad otherwise.” Rachel nods, conceding the point. Brittany can be painfully, intensely honest, but she’s never been _cruel_. “I mean, for some of the girls who barely make the cut, maybe it’s a requirement, and Coach Sylvester definitely encourages it, but—“ Quinn shakes her head. “The way I treated you and Kurt and everyone else, it wasn’t about you guys, and it wasn’t about cheerleading.”

“And what _was_ it about?” Rachel asks, sitting down beside Quinn on the bed. Quinn shrugs.

“Haven’t gotten that far in my therapy yet,” she says. It’s just nonchalant enough that Rachel doesn’t quite believe her, but she lets it go.

“I didn’t know you went to therapy,” she says instead, which arguably may not be any easier of a subject, but at least it’s information Quinn offered up, rather than skillfully lying about.

“My mom sent me after I moved back in,” Quinn says. “I think she thinks it’ll help me get over being kicked out while pregnant and giving up my baby and my parents getting divorced and L—“ She stops. “She thinks it’ll help me get over it.”

“What were you going to say?” Rachel says, unable to stop herself from pushing for _more_. She managed to stop herself earlier; that’s one more time than she’s usually capable of. “Parents getting divorced and…?”

“Nothing,” Quinn says. She stands up from the bed. “You wanna go do something?” Rachel, contrary to popular belief, can recognize a rejection when she hears one—she just usually doesn’t care enough to respect them.

For Quinn, though, she’ll always care.

“Sure,” Rachel says, standing as well. “We could get coffee, or go to the park, or—“ Rachel’s phone rings. She glances down at it, feeling a familiar tug in her chest when she sees the name on the screen. “Sorry,” she says, glancing up at Quinn. “It’s—it’s Finn.” Something unidentifiable flashes in Quinn’s eyes, and she steps back, moving towards Rachel’s bedroom door.

“I’ll go look for something to eat,” she says, “let you answer that.” Rachel bites her lip, uncertain how to navigate the _your-ex-boyfriend-who-you-tricked-into-thinking-he-was-the-father-of-your-baby-who-is-now-sort-of-not-really-my-boyfriend-is-calling_ situation. She doesn’t have the chance to, though, because Quinn escapes the room and disappears down the stairs.

“Hello, Finn,” Rachel says into the phone instead.

“ _Hey, Rach_ ,” Finn says, that familiar, dopily happy tone in his voice. Rachel smiles a little bit at the sound. She isn’t sure how she feels about Finn, or even what they’re doing together, but he is sweet, when he tries. And his mostly-unfailing optimism is nice.

(Rachel can’t help but think, though, that _sweet_ and _nice_ aren’t really the kind of words she used to feel for him, nor the kind that make a relationship last.)

“ _Do you wanna come hang out_?” Finn is saying. “ _There’s some musical marathon thing on TV._ ” _That_ —that’s nice, too. Rachel hadn’t expected Finn to be a very attentive boyfriend—or friend, or whatever it is that they’re doing—and he isn’t, really, but he _tries_ , at least, to think of her interests, even if he doesn’t share them.

“It’s very nice of you to think of me,” Rachel says. “But unfortunately, I have a prior commitment today.” Finn doesn’t say anything. Rachel can just picture him blinking at her confusedly, and she clarifies, “I’m hanging out with Quinn.”

“ _Quinn_?” Finn asks. “ _You guys are friends now_?” There’s a note of—of judgment, or distaste, or _something_ , in his voice, and it irks Rachel.

“Yes,” she says. “My fathers did adopt her baby, if you recall.”

“ _Well, yeah, but—_ “ Finn sighs. “ _I don’t know, Rach. I just don’t want you to get hurt, you know? Quinn isn’t a good person_.” That makes Rachel bristle.

“I can understand why you would hold that opinion of her,” she says, her tone clipped, “considering how she treated you, but Quinn has been nothing but courteous to me lately, and I would appreciate you withholding judgment until you get to know who she is now.”

“ _Whoa_ ,” Finn says. “ _Hey, I wasn’t trying to make you mad. I’m just trying to help. I don’t like it when people hurt you, and Quinn hurts people a lot._ ” Rachel exhales, pushing the surge of _protectiveness_ towards Quinn away.

“I know,” she says. “That’s sweet of you, Finn, but I don’t need you to protect me. I can handle Quinn.”

“ _Okay_.” Finn changes topics, although Rachel has the sinking feeling that she hasn’t heard the last of this. “ _So, if you can’t hang out today, do you wanna tomorrow_?”

“Sure,” Rachel agrees. “I’ll text you later to figure out the details. I have to go, Quinn is waiting for me.” Finn says goodbye, and Rachel hangs up. She wanders downstairs, wondering vaguely wondering what Quinn has found to eat.

The answer is nothing, apparently. Rachel comes around the corner into the kitchen and Quinn is standing in front of the fridge with the door open, staring into it blankly.

“Quinn?” Rachel says. Quinn doesn’t respond. Frowning, Rachel reaches out and taps her shoulder. Quinn starts slightly, turning to face Rachel. “What are you doing?” Rachel asks. Quinn blinks, glancing back at the fridge. She lets go of the door handle, and the fridge falls shut.

“I don’t know,” she says. “Just spaced out, I guess.”

“Are you alright?” Without thinking, Rachel reaches out, pressing her the back of her hand against Quinn’s forehead to check for a fever. Shockingly, Quinn doesn’t shy away from the contact—although she does roll her eyes at Rachel’s fretting.

“I’m fine,” she says. “I’m just tired.” Something _nags_ at Rachel. She had done a lot of reading on pregnancy when she had first learned about Quinn, wanting to help anyway she could, and right now, a few articles she had stumbled across are sticking in her mind.

“You’re tired a lot,” she says.

“I did have a baby.”

“A month ago, yes,” Rachel says.

“Rachel.” Quinn’s tone is a warning, one that says, _don’t push_. Rachel pushes anyway.

“Would you say your chronic exhaustion started after you gave birth to Ellie?” she asks.

“I wouldn’t say I’m chronically exhausted,” Quinn says, exasperated. “I wouldn’t say I’m exhausted at _all_ , actually.”

“Right, because the leftover spaghetti was just so fascinating to stare at for three minutes,” Rachel says.

“Would you leave it _alone_?” Quinn snaps. She’s glaring at Rachel, and Rachel shrinks back instinctively. It’s the same tone and glare that have preceded a thousand insults about her hands, her nose, her clothes. “God, Rachel, mind your own fucking business for once!”

“This _is_ my business,” Rachel protests. “I _care_ about you, Quinn! I’m trying to help!”

“Why?” Quinn says.

“I just told you, I care about—“

“ _Why_?” The edge to Quinn’s voice has vanished, replaced by a slight tremor. “Why do you _care_ so damn much?” Rachel blinks. She hadn’t anticipated this. She’s pretty sure she’s seen a greater variety of emotions from Quinn in the last thirty seconds than she did in their entire first year of high school.

“I…” Rachel shakes her head. “What do you mean?”

“I treated you like _shit_ , Rachel,” Quinn says, and _oh God, she’s crying, what do I do? What am_ I _supposed to do with a crying Quinn Fabray?_ “I made your life _hell_ for a year and a half, I bullied you and all your friends, the slushies I ordered on you probably ruined half your wardrobe—I let your dads take my baby because I’m too fucked up to love her properly—“

“ _Quinn_.” Rachel steps forward and pulls Quinn into a hug. Quinn struggles against it for a moment, pushing and pulling at Rachel’s shoulders, until she gives up and leans into it, burying her face in Rachel’s neck and starting to sob. Rachel just holds her tighter. “Quinn,” she says softly. “You are a _good_ person, okay? You’ve made mistakes, yes, but I’ve long since forgiven you for them, and you are _not_ the things you’ve done to survive. You are _good_.” She continues in the same vein for a few minutes, murmuring kindnesses into Quinn’s ear over her quiet cries. Finally, Quinn takes a deep, shuddering breath, and steps back from the hug.

“I just…don’t understand,” she says, shaking her head. “You shouldn’t _want_ to be my friend, Rachel. Why are you so…”

“High school sucks,” Rachel says. Quinn smiles slightly at the brutal honesty, looking away. “None of us are who we want to be right now. The bullying and the slushies and all of it is—yes, it’s despicable, but it kept you _safe_. It kept you on top. Maybe that shouldn’t matter, but it _does_ , and I can’t blame you for doing your best in the environment we’re all trapped in.”

“But you don’t do that stuff,” Quinn says. “You never have.”

“I have no power.” Rachel shrugs. “What would be the point of me throwing a slushie or calling someone a rude name when it wouldn’t get me anything? I’ve always admired that about you, Quinn. You know what you’re doing. You don’t do anything without a purpose, and your actions put you exactly where you wanted to be.”

“But you could’ve done that, too,” Quinn says. “You could’ve been a Cheerio freshman year if you had tried, and done the same things I did to get to the top—“ Rachel is laughing before Quinn gets halfway through her sentence.

“Me, a Cheerio,” she echoes. “With a nose job and an extra cup size, maybe.” 

“What?” Quinn shakes her head. “No, I’m serious. You’re gorgeous, and you’re a good dancer, which translates pretty well to cheerleading, you just—chose _not_ to. You’re _yourself_ , instead of one of Coach Sylvester’s drones. I gave up, instead.”

“Quinn.” Rachel rolls her eyes. “Please be serious. I never could’ve had what you had. You took advantage of your situation, and I took advantage of mine. The only difference between us is where those situations took us.”

“I don’t believe that,” Quinn says firmly. “You’re a good person, Rachel.”

“So are you,” Rachel says. Quinn stares at her for a long moment, then shakes her head and looks away.

“I don’t deserve you,” she says. Rachel can read signals when she chooses, and this clearly signals the end of their argument.

So, instead of debating the point, Rachel just flips her hair over her shoulder and says, “No one does.” She's clearly joking, and Quinn laughs, wiping the last of the tears from her cheeks. “Now, I am actually hungry. What’s in here, anyway?” Rachel pulls the fridge open, and Quinn steps up beside her, looking over her shoulder, the tension in the room fading away.

* * *

“You talk about Rachel a lot,” Dr. McMillan says neutrally, after Quinn has finished with her relation of her fight with Rachel the day before.

“Seriously?” Quinn says, raising an eyebrow. “ _That’s_ what you got from that story? Not going to get into my clearly deep-seated issues around my self-worth or anything?” Dr. McMillan gives her a _look_ , and Quinn leans back in her chair, sighing. “Yeah, I’m obsessed with her, whatever,” she says, waving a hand.

“Obsessed?” Dr. McMillan says, mirroring Quinn’s raised eyebrow. “Why do you call it an obsession?”

“Because it’s—“ Quinn takes a moment, searching for the right words. “It’s not like a crush or something, because I bullied her for two years over it, right? People don’t do that to girls they like. And now it’s like, her dads adopted my baby, so we’re kind of related, so it’s _weird_.”

“Okay, we both know that you are not _related_ to Rachel in any way, legally, biologically, or emotionally,” Dr. McMillan says. “So I’m going to ignore that excuse. But the bullying—you didn’t come to terms with your sexuality until after you got pregnant, correct?” Quinn nods. “And you grew up in a home that was both incredibly emotionally repressive _and_ homophobic. Expressing your feelings at _all_ was something to be avoided, let alone expressing your feelings towards another girl. Isn’t it possible that those feelings manifested as bullying?”

“Yes,” Quinn says. “I’m not _denying_ that how I used to treat Rachel was partly about my—my sexuality and being attracted to her, or even…interested in her. I’m saying, it’s not a crush, or any kind of legitimate romantic feeling, because if it was, I wouldn’t have wanted to _hurt_ her.” Dr. McMillan hums in that infuriatingly unexpressive way that she’s excellent at—making it clear that she’s _thinking_ without letting Quinn guess _what_ she’s thinking.

“What sort of names did you call Rachel, when you bullied her?” she asks. Quinn blinks.

“Why would I tell you—“

“Humor me.” Dr. McMillan raises that eyebrow at Quinn again, and Quinn sighs heavily.

“Man hands…was pretty common,” she says. “Treasure trail, um, stubbles, RuPaul—“

“Do you notice any kind of pattern with these insults?” Dr. McMillan interrupts. Quinn would normally get angry at being cut off, but she takes the out happily. She has no interest in reliving more of her worst moments.

“Pattern?” she asks.

“They’re all masculinizing,” Dr. McMillan says. “They all assign Rachel male characteristics. Would you describe Rachel as a masculine person?”

“ _Rachel_?” Quinn says incredulously. “Absolutely not. She’s _tiny_ , and wears dresses all the time, and has really nice hair—“

“So why call her a boy?”

“Easy,” Quinn says, “the only people Lima hates more than gay people are trans people.”

“ _Or_ ,” Dr. McMillan says, “maybe you were attempting to legitimize your attraction to Rachel. If she were a boy, or at the very least, masculine, it wouldn’t be quite as shameful to find her appealing.” Quinn leans back in her chair, feeling vaguely sick to her stomach.

“Is it your job to make me realize I’m actually a way worse person than I thought I was?” she says. “ _Jesus_. I bullied her so I could feel better about her stupid _skirts_ turning me on?” Quinn stands up, unable to sit still anymore, and walks around behind her chair, where there’s a window looking over downtown Lima. “That’s…” Dr. McMillan doesn’t push her to finish the sentence, letting her collect herself at the window for a few moments.

_I’m disgusting. I’m actually fucking disgusting, oh my God_. Quinn doesn’t realize she’s spoken aloud until Dr. McMillan says her name quietly from behind her. Quinn turns.

“Can you tell me what the first thing you think of when you think of Rachel is?” Dr. McMillan asks.

“Sectionals,” Quinn says immediately. “The other teams stole our setlist and we had to improvise. Rachel sang _Don’t Rain On My Parade_ , and it—“ Quinn shakes her head. She can’t describe that performance. She can’t even begin to _try_.

“Okay,” Dr. McMillan says. “And what’s your favorite thing about Rachel?” That takes Quinn a bit longer, but only a few moments.

“Her determination,” she says. “She just—she wants _everything_ , and she is so, so determined to get it. Nothing gets in her way, she never gives up. It makes her _so_ annoying sometimes, but at the end of the day, it’s going to get her out of Lima. It’s going to get her on Broadway, and it’s going to be _unbelievably good_.”

“And your least favorite thing?” That takes Quinn the longest. She thinks about it for a long moment, leaning over the back of her chair.

“She cares too much,” she says finally. “ _Everything_ is life and death for her. I don’t think she’s ever been detached from something in her life.”

“Why don’t you like that?” Dr. McMillan asks, sounding more personally curious than professionally interested. Quinn has gotten good at telling the difference over the past month and a half. “Aren’t empathy and passion attractive qualities?”

“Well, yeah, but…” Quinn shakes her head. “It keeps getting her _hurt_. If she learned to not care, she’d be a lot happier.” Dr. McMillan does _not_ look like she agrees with that assessment, but she doesn’t argue the point.

“So, Quinn,” she says instead. “It’s my impression that you think you have some kind of perverted, unhealthy obsession with Rachel. Would you say that’s accurate?” Quinn looks down at the chair in front of her, feeling shame hot on her face. She nods. “And yet, your first thought of Rachel is one of her doing what she loves, your favorite quality of hers is one that I’m willing to bet she's also extremely proud of, and you only dislike your least favorite quality of hers because you don’t like to watch her get hurt. Is that also accurate?” Quinn really, _really_ doesn’t like where this is going. Dr. McMillan sets down the pen and paper she brings to each of their sessions and looks Quinn in the eye, smiling slightly.

“What part of that sounds unhealthy? No, what part of that _doesn’t_ sound like perfectly healthy, and honestly, kind of sweet, _love_? Even though the way you displayed it was terrible, and toxic for you both, what’s wrong with just the way you _feel_ about Rachel?”

“I don’t deserve her,” Quinn says after a long moment, tears in her eyes. “I never will.” Dr. McMillan gives her a sympathetic look.

“Maybe we should save the deep-seated self-worth issues for our next session,” she says. Quinn laughs.

“Yeah,” she mutters, wiping at her eyes. “Yeah. Um, thanks.” Dr. McMillan nods, and Quinn flees the office, as fast as she possibly can.

* * *

Finn and Rachel end up going bowling. It’s…not _not_ fun, but the bowling alley smells like fake cheese and cigarette smoke, permanently ingrained in the floor from before they stopped letting people smoke in the building, and Rachel can’t stop thinking about the fact that she’s wearing someone else’s shoes. She feels kind of like Ms. Pillsbury, obsessed with germs, but she does _not_ trust that the bored teenager behind the counter who rented her the shoes made any attempt to clean them between uses, and it’s _gross_. Rachel can’t help but breathe a sigh of relief when they step out of the building and back into fresh air. Finn doesn’t seem to notice, and it irks Rachel, just a bit. He’s so unobservant sometimes.

“You wanna go to Breadstix?” Finn asks as they climb into his car. The slight irritation Rachel is feeling grows.

“I’d rather not,” she says. “Their only ‘vegan’ option is a salad that you have to pick the cheese off of yourself.” Finn blinks.

“Uh, right,” he says. “Well, is there somewhere else you wanna go?” Rachel considers it for a moment.

“We could just go to your house?” she says. She knows that Kurt tends to keep a decent selection of vegetables around the house—Finn and his mother had moved back in with the Hummels around the beginning of the summer—and she can throw together a far better salad than Breadstix, even if her culinary skills end just about there.

“Sure,” Finn says, grinning at her as he starts the car. They drive back to his house in relatively comfortable silence, Rachel humming along to the radio and Finn shooting her adoring looks at stoplights. It makes her a little bit uncomfortable, actually. Like she’s performing for him, when she really isn’t. She’s just enjoying the music, not trying to show off. She ignores the sensation, though, and tries to enjoy the attention. The boy she’s been after for _months_ is smiling at her; she should be happy.

(She’s not _unhappy_ , at least.)

“Kurt’s at Mercedes’ place,” Finn says as they head into the house. “And my mom is out with his dad tonight.” Rachel hums in acknowledgement, heading for the kitchen and the food that awaits her. Finn catches up to her, slipping his hand into hers as they step into the kitchen. He uses the contact to tug her around, and she goes with motion at first, smiling curiously, until he spins her into him and pulls her into a kiss.

“ _Oh_.” Rachel pulls back, blinking in surprise. Finn pauses, blinking at her.

“Was that…not okay?” he says.

“It was…unexpected,” Rachel says, carefully not answering the question.

“Oh.” Finn frowns. “I figured, when you said you wanted to go to my place, you meant, like, coming over to make out.”

“Ah…not exactly,” Rachel says, wincing. “I really am hungry.” Finn shrugs and drops her hand.

“I could eat first, too,” he says, and Rachel sighs.

The kiss, if nothing else about the day, had confirmed it for her. She doesn’t want Finn, not the way that he wants her. She’d had a decent time hanging out with him that afternoon, and really, she’d like to be _friends_ with him, but she doesn’t want to be _with_ him.

(She wants to be with _Quinn_.)

“I…I don’t really want to make out at all, actually,” Rachel says, biting the bullet. Finn blinks at her. “I think we should just be friends, Finn.”

“But you like me,” Finn says, shaking his head. “You spent all of last year trying to break up me and Quinn. And now—what, you just don’t like me anymore?”

“I _do_ like you,” Rachel says. “Just…not like that. You’re very sweet, Finn, and I want to be friends with you, but I—I don’t want to date you, and I don’t want to lead you on. So…”

“I don’t get it,” Finn says. “What’d I do wrong? I took you out all the time, and listened whenever you talked about Broadway even though it’s kind of boring, and didn’t even get annoyed when you wouldn’t let me touch your boobs—“

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Rachel interrupts. Finn sounds _hurt_ , and it’s upsetting Rachel, too. “You didn’t. It’s just—there’s someone else.”

“You’re cheating on me?” Finn asks, and Rachel does a double take.

“No,” she says. “I mean, we’re not dating, at least not exclusively, so that wouldn’t even be possible, but regardless, I haven’t _done_ anything. There’s just…someone else that I have feelings for. Strong feelings.”

“Stronger than your feelings for me,” Finn says. Rachel bites her lip anxiously, but nods. Finn glares at the tile floor for a moment. “I think you should go,” he says eventually.

“Finn—“

“No,” Finn says. “No, you need to leave.” Reluctantly, Rachel nods and leaves the kitchen, heading for the front door. Finn doesn’t follow her as she slips her shoes back on and leaves. It’s as she’s stepping out the door that she hears a crashing noise and an angry shout from the kitchen, and she winces, hoping that, whatever damage Finn is doing, he’s not doing damage to himself.

It’s not a _long_ walk back to her house from Finn’s, but Rachel doesn’t want to walk all the same. She pulls her phone out, intending to dial—

_Quinn_ , the screen proclaims as the phone buzzes in her hand with an incoming call. Rachel picks up.

“Quinn,” she says. “Just who I was intending to call! Would you perhaps be able to come pick me up? I’m—well, it’s rather complicated, actually, but I’m walking right now and would rather not walk the entire way home.”

“ _Rachel_ ,” Quinn says, and though her tone contains a note of amusement, Rachel immediately picks up on everything else in it: exhaustion, mostly, along with pain and resignation.

“Are you alright?” Rachel asks. “You sound—“

“ _I’m fine_ ,” Quinn interrupts. “ _Look—where are you? I’ll come pick you up_.” Rachel glances up, noting the street signs on the nearest corner, and gives the address to Quinn. Quinn hangs up without another word, and Rachel pulls the phone away from her ear, frowning at it before she puts it away. It’s not like Quinn to be so abrupt with her—at least not recently.

She doesn’t have long to ponder it. Quinn comes rolling up beside her in her car only minutes after she hangs up the phone, and Rachel slips into the passenger seat, realizing as she does so that she’s somehow never been in Quinn’s car before. It’s small—cute, almost—and the inside smells like vanilla: not the fake, overbearing vanilla of an air freshener, but like Quinn actually baked cookies in here or something.

_Of course even her_ car _smells good._

“Hello,” Rachel says, smiling at Quinn over the center console, although she’s well aware it lacks her usual enthusiasm. Quinn offers her a similarly drained smile.

“Hi,” Quinn says quietly as she pulls away from the curb. “Can we go to your place?”

“Sure.” Rachel examines the side of Quinn’s face, noting the redness in her eyes. “Are you sure you’re okay, Quinn?” Quinn exhales shakily, not taking her eyes off the road.

“I had, um,” she licks her lips, “a really tough session with my therapist.”

“Oh.” Rachel isn’t entirely sure how to have a conversation about that. She’s been in therapy since eighth grade herself, to help her cope with the bullying, but she’s never really told anyone about it, or even _had_ anyone to tell other than her fathers, who have never asked her for details about her sessions. “I’m sorry.”

“No, not—“ Quinn makes a frustrated noise. “Not like, _bad_. Just…hard.” She pulls onto Rachel’s street. “We talked about the way I used to treat you and…people like you. And the reasons for it.” Rachel doesn’t say anything, and Quinn doesn’t elaborate. They pull into Rachel’s driveway, and Rachel takes her seatbelt off, but she hesitates before she opens the car door. Quinn isn’t moving, one hand on the steering wheel, one still holding the key where she had turned the car off.

“It’s just all so screwed _up_ , Rach,” Quinn says after a moment. “And knowing why I did it, it just gets more complicated. Not better, just more _complicated_ , and—my life is complicated enough, right?” She doesn’t seem to want an answer. Instead, Rachel just reaches across the car and wraps her hand around Quinn’s where it holds her car keys. “Whatever,” Quinn says, shaking her head. “Let’s just go inside.” Reluctantly, Rachel releases Quinn’s hand, and they both climb out of the car.

“You know you can tell me anything, right?” Rachel says to Quinn as they take off their shoes in the entryway. “Whatever’s making things so…complicated. You can tell me.” Quinn says nothing, not even turning to look at Rachel. Rachel sighs heavily, but doesn’t push. There’s a tension in Quinn’s shoulders that hasn’t been there since her head Cheerio days, and it makes Rachel a bit nervous, puts her on her guard enough that she doesn’t want to ask about it.

“Can I go see Ellie?” Quinn says quietly as they make their way into the house. Rachel blinks at her.

“You don’t have to ask permission,” she says. “You know that.” It had been one of the rules her dads had agreed on with Quinn: she can see her daughter at the house whenever she wants to, but she has to ask permission to take Ellie anywhere else, amongst other things. Quinn shrugs, still not looking at Rachel, and they head into the house. Rachel trails behind her, watching Quinn’s much-shorter hair float around her neck. The way Quinn is moving, with that mysterious weight back on her shoulders, makes Rachel’s chest ache in a way she doesn’t fully understand.

She doesn’t have time to analyze it, though, because they turn the corner into Ellie’s nursery, and Puck is standing there with Hiram, cradling Ellie in his arms. Quinn stops in her tracks at the sight, and Rachel nearly walks into her. Puck turns to look at them, and his face splits into a grin at the sight of Quinn.

“Hey, baby mama,” he says. “Rach.” Rachel nods at him in greeting, more concerned with the way Quinn is trembling ever so slightly. He bounces Ellie lightly in his arms, looking down at her with that giant grin still on his face. “Look at her,” he says, only partially to the two of them. “Isn’t she pretty?” No one responds to him for a long moment.

“Yeah,” Quinn says eventually. “Pretty.” Rachel, unable to stop herself, slips her hand into Quinn’s, twining their fingers together and squeezing tightly. Quinn doesn’t return the pressure, but she doesn’t pull away, either. “I’ll come back later,” Quinn says finally, still watching Puck with their daughter.

“Why?” Puck says, glancing up at her with a frown. “She’s not crying or anything, now’s the best time to hang out with her.”

“I’ll come back,” Quinn says again, pulling her hand out of Rachel’s and walking quickly out of the room. Puck looks at Rachel, visibly confused.

“Is she okay?” Hiram asks. Rachel frowns.

“I…” She shrugs. “I’ll go find out.” She glances at Puck again, who is already back to staring at Ellie, completely absorbed in her. It’s sweet, and Rachel leaves the room with a smile.

She finds Quinn in her room, sitting on Rachel’s bed.

“Hey,” Rachel says, leaning against the doorframe. “Are you alright?” Quinn looks up at her and smiles wanly, but the expression crumbles quickly.

“He loves her,” Quinn says quietly, letting her gaze drop back down to her lap. Rachel steps forward and sits next to her, leaving some space between them. For a moment, she has a vicious bout of deja vu—flashing back to a moment that fall, after the secret of Ellie’s parentage had come out, when Rachel had followed Quinn down the hallway and sat a few feet away from her, looking for forgiveness. The distance between them then had been a barrier, a fence: something there to keep Rachel safe, keep Quinn from hurting her.

Now, Rachel leaves distance between them because she’s worried that if she gets too close, she’ll fall right _into_ Quinn. It’s still a matter of self-preservation, but Rachel is risking _so much_ _more_.

“He does,” Rachel says, confused. “Why would that bother you?” Quinn exhales, long and slow, tipping her head back and closing her eyes.

“Because I don’t,” she says. “I don’t love her, Rachel. I hold her, I hold my own _daughter_ , and I don’t feel _anything_.” Rachel throws caution to the wind. She slides over on the bed, putting her arm around Quinn’s shoulders and pulling her into a hug. Quinn stiffens in her arms, but Rachel doesn’t let go.

“Quinn,” she says, and Quinn bolts to her feet, pushing out of Rachel’s arms.

“What are you doing?” Quinn asks, her voice half-panicked. “Why are you touching me?”

“I—“ Rachel frowns at her. “You’re upset. I was just—“

“No, I mean—“ Quinn makes a frustrated noise. “Do you even listen to me when I talk?”

“What?”

“First you—you try to convince me that it’s _okay_ , the way I used to treat you,” Quinn says. “And now I tell you that I _don’t love_ my daughter and you just—you just fucking _hug_ me, like it doesn’t even _matter_!”

“It matters,” Rachel says. “It’s upsetting you. Of course it matters.” Quinn shakes her head.

“You don’t get it,” she says. “Why don’t you _get_ it, Rachel? I’m a _terrible_ person, okay? You said it yourself. When I was on the Cheerios I was terrible, and I haven’t changed. I’m vindictive and angry and sinful and cruel and—and—“ She’s hyperventilating now, almost wheezing, and Rachel gets up, stepping towards her, not knowing what else to do. Quinn holds a hand up, though, and Rachel stops. Slowly, Quinn regains control of her breathing, though her shoulders are still trembling slightly. “I can’t even love my _daughter_ , Rachel,” Quinn says finally. “I don’t think I’m capable of love at all.”

“Quinn.” Rachel reaches out, pulling Quinn’s hand into her own, and Quinn allows the contact. Rachel can feel Quinn trembling through her fingertips. “I don’t believe that.” Quinn starts to protest, but Rachel shakes her head, talking over her. “Listen, how you feel about Ellie…have you heard of post partum depression?” Quinn blinks at her, shaking her head slightly. “It happens to a lot of women after they give birth. Depression, anxiety, insomnia, exhaustion. Problems bonding with your baby.” Something flashes in Quinn’s eyes. “It also tends to run in families, so you may want to ask your mother if she experienced anything like this—“

“You’re saying,” Quinn interrupts, “you’re saying there’s—nothing wrong with me? This is _normal_?”

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” Rachel says, nodding firmly. “It’s not _normal_ exactly, it doesn’t happen to everyone, but you’re far from the first. And you’re not alone.” Quinn holds her hand a little bit more tightly.

“You’re really not going anywhere?” she asks. It’s…half joking, half something _else_ that makes Rachel’s chest hurt.

“I’m staying right here,” Rachel says, “with you.” As she says it, she realizes that it’s _true_.

She’ll stand here with Quinn until the sun explodes, if Quinn asks her to.

* * *

“So,” Kurt says as Rachel settles onto his couch beside him, vegan ice cream and spoon at the ready. “What was so serious that it required an emergency ice-cream-and-venting session?” Rachel points her spoon at him.

“You _can’t_ tell _anyone_ about any of this,” she says firmly. Kurt rolls his eyes and begins to respond snarkily, but Rachel talks over him. “I’m being serious, Kurt. You could destroy _lives_ with what I’m about to tell you, and I trust you, but I don’t know if I trust you _that_ much.” Kurt looks at her for a moment, frowning.

“You’re being serious,” he says. Rachel nods. “Okay, then,” he says. “Consider this the couch of secrets. What is said will not leave this room.”

“I ended things with Finn,” Rachel says, continuing when Kurt begins to speak up, “but that’s not the _thing_. I broke up with him because I have feelings for someone else.”

“Okay,” Kurt says, clearly unimpressed with the caliber of gossip thus far.

“It’s—since the adoption, Quinn has been coming around a lot,” she says. “And—I don’t know. I’ve always felt _connected_ to her, I suppose, but I never gave it much thought—or avoided thinking about it, I suppose. But now we’re friends, and…I’m realizing that it’s sort of your fault, since it was her haircut that made me figure it out, oddly enough. And now it’s just _constant_. I—“

“Hold on,” Kurt says, raising a hand. “I’m sorry, you’re going to have spell this out for me. Are you seriously telling me right now that you have feelings for _Quinn Fabray_?” Rachel stares down at her untouched ice cream.

“I—I think I may be falling in love with her,” she says. Kurt is quiet for a long moment.

“I didn’t take you for a masochist,” he says eventually, and that sets something off in Rachel. She starts laughing, and then crying. Kurt slides over on the couch, slipping an arm around her shoulders.

“I think I would have to be _enjoying_ it, to be a masochist,” she says, voice shaking. “I just—she’s _so beautiful_ , Kurt, and—she likes poetry, did you know that? She likes poetry, and bad horror movies, and she’s _funny_ , and—“ Kurt shushes her gently, pulling her further into his shoulder. Rachel doesn’t protest, curling up against him and trying to slow her breathing down.

“I didn’t even know you were gay,” he says eventually, when Rachel is no longer actively crying.

“I don’t know what I am,” she says. “I think I’m just obsessive. And right now it’s all Quinn, all the time, up here.” She taps the side of her head.

“You couldn’t have picked _any_ other girl from Glee club to have your gay panic about?” Kurt says, teasing. He’s bringing levity to the moment, levity that Rachel desperately needs. She _needs_ this to be funny, light, _something_ other than a death sentence. “You couldn’t have picked, like…I don’t know, Tina? Anyone other than the mother of your baby sister.” Rachel half-laughs.

“I think that’s a small obstacle in comparison to Quinn’s religious convictions and overwhelming heterosexuality,” she points out.

“I mean, she did give her baby to a gay couple,” Kurt says thoughtfully. “She can’t be _homophobic_.”

“There’s a difference between making a good choice for your child’s future and finding out that the girl whose bed you sleep in on a regular basis has big gay feelings for you,” Rachel says.

“She sleeps in your bed?”

“We—“ Rachel sighs. “She likes being held, okay? I’m not about to say _no_.” Kurt gets this _smirk_ on his face.

“She likes being held,” he repeats. “Are you telling me that _Quinn Fabray_ likes being the little spoon?” Rachel shoves at his chest as he starts laughing.

“Shut up,” she mumbles. “Shut up, this is serious.” Kurt settles down and holds her a little bit tighter.

“I know it is, Rach,” he says. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know.” Rachel leans into his shoulder. “There’s not much I can do, I suppose. Like you said, it’s a bit masochistic, isn’t it?” Kurt hums.

“You couldn’t have picked up a safer hobby than crushing on _Quinn Fabray_?” he says. “Say, base jumping or skydiving or—“

“ _Shush_.” Rachel finally starts in on her ice cream, which is half-melted by this point.

“It’s going to be okay,” Kurt says after awhile. “I got over my crush on Finn, right? You can get over this.” Rachel makes a noncommittal noise and takes another bite of her ice cream.

Kurt sounds sure, but Rachel can’t quite believe him.

* * *

“Rachel may be right,” Dr. McMillan says, her steady gaze trained on Quinn.

“It could be this…post-partum thing?” Quinn asks, clearing her throat against the desperate note trying to work its way into her voice. Dr. McMillan sighs, setting her notepad down for a moment.

“It could be,” she says. “Although I think it might be more complicated than that.” Quinn blinks at her. “Going off your descriptions of your mental state before you were pregnant, and of your childhood, I think it’s safe to say that you’ve had underlying mental health issues for quite awhile.” Quinn nods in agreement. “So, I have two guesses: first, you developed post-partum depression after Ellie’s birth, and since it’s gone untreated, it’s become chronic.”

“Sounds reasonable,” Quinn says. Dr. McMillan nods.

“Secondly, and I’m tempted to lean towards this theory,” she says, “you’ve had some sort of mental illness for a lot of your life, and the stress of your pregnancy, Ellie’s birth, and the subsequent adoption has brought it to the surface, where it’s manifested as an inability to bond with your daughter, among other things.”

“Okay,” Quinn says. She likes the second theory less, but she doesn’t show it. “I mean, it could be either, right? Does it make a difference which one is true?” Dr. McMillan shrugs.

“Not particularly,” she says. “Either way, my recommendations for treatment are the same.”

“And what are they?” Quinn asks.

“Continued therapy,” Dr. McMillan says. “Increasing the frequency of our appointments, and focusing more on your depression and issues surrounding Ellie. And, if it’s necessary, some kind of medication.”

“Medication,” Quinn repeats. “What kind of _medication_ are we talking about here?” In her head, she can’t help but imagine some kind of… _mental hospital_ scenario: little green pills in a plastic cup that leave her sedated, sluggish and empty. She knows that the thought probably isn’t accurate—therapy certainly hasn’t been what she imagined it to be—but she can’t help it. She was raised a certain way, a way which certainly did not allow for _medication_ for _mental illnesses_.

“It depends,” Dr. McMillan says. “It would probably take a few tries to find a medication and dosage that works for you, but antidepressants could help stop your mood swings, regulate your sleeping patterns, maybe even bond with Ellie.” Quinn nods, a lump in her throat.

“Can that—I want that to be a last resort,” she says. “I don’t want medication unless I _have_ to have it.” Dr. McMillan nods.

“Of course,” she says. “But I also don’t want you to be afraid of that possibility, okay, Quinn? Medication is a big thing, but there’s no shame in it, and it won’t change who you are.”

“What if I want to change?” Quinn half-whispers. Dr. McMillan smiles at her.

“Then it will take a lot of hard work on your part,” she says. “And if you’re successful, then it will be because _you_ put the work in, not because of me, or because of any pill.”

“Alright.” Quinn shifts in her chair. “Let’s put together a schedule for my sessions.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you guys liked this!! as far as the depictions of therapy go: i have been to therapy but i am also fairly sure i have never had a good therapist. to be clear quinn is seeing a psychiatrist, who can actually prescribe medication, but i see my psychiatrist like every six months to a year, and she's also the weirdest lady on the planet, so who knows how it's supposed to go? i'm making this shit up, feel free to give me constructive criticism for future work.
> 
> anyways! i'm on tumblr @daisys-quake and on twitter @thoughtsintoink, feel free to hmu on either. i'd love to hear your thoughts. also, i recently wrote a faberry christmas-ish fic, so give that a read as well. leave a comment and kudos if you enjoyed, it encourages me to write the next chapter that much faster :)

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading everyone. i'm on tumblr @daisys-quake and on twitter @thoughtsintoink if you wanna yell at me. this was probably the fluffiest chapter of this whole thing, just fyi. we're not headed anywhere happy for awhile yet. please, please leave a comment if you liked it; i want motivation.
> 
> (also i just got into college last monday and i want attention for it)


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